Rumphi fire, 7 August 2020 Rumphi
The fire started on 7 August 2020 in Rumphi, Malawi, and satellites saw it burning for 3 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 1,800 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.
It is the 147th largest in Northern Region since 2016 (of 418 with a page). Number 30 in Malawi in 2020, of 87.
- Burnt area
- 1,800ha
- GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
- Duration
- 3days
- 7 Aug 2020 – 9 Aug 2020
- Municipalities hit
- 1
- districts
- Started on
- 7 Aug
- 2020
- Heat detections
- 40
- in a single hotspot: 103 MW
- Energy released
- 678MW
- sum of detected power
Where it burned
How it evolved, day by day
Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.
This area had burned before
99% of the perimeter overlaps earlier fires recorded since 2016: 1,107 ha in 2016, 1,742 ha in 2017, 1,151 ha in 2018, 796 ha in 2019. Part of it burned more than once, so the yearly figures add up to more than the 1,789 ha that had burned before.
- 1,708 ha Rumphi fire, September 2017 5,896 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 1,044 ha Rumphi fire, September 2016 1,577 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 856 ha Rumphi fire, August 2018 1,148 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 747 ha Rumphi fire, August 2019 1,950 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 294 ha Rumphi fire, August 2018 1,046 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 62 ha Rumphi fire, July 2016 1,389 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 49 ha Rumphi fire, August 2019 11,230 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
- 34 ha Rumphi fire, August 2017 1,046 ha in total; the hectares shown are those it shares with this fire
What happened to each town
-
Rumphi where it started1,810 ha reached on 7 Aug0.4 %
Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.
Before and after, from space
Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.
If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.
Detections table · 40Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
| Date and time | Satellite | FRP (MW) | Lat | Lon |
|---|
Other fires nearby
- 5,896 haRumphi15 September 2017 · 4 days · 3 km away
- 5,477 haRumphi23 July 2026 · 6 days · 3 km away
- 11,230 haRumphi3 August 2019 · 7 days · 5 km away
- 7,693 haChitipa29 July 2016 · 6 days · 26 km away
- 4,941 haMafinga16 October 2017 · 3 days · 32 km away
- 4,919 haChama30 September 2026 · 11 days · 38 km away
Frequently asked questions
- How long did the Rumphi fire last?
- GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 7 August 2020 and 9 August 2020: 3 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
- How much area did it burn?
- The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 1,800 hectares (18.0 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
- Which municipalities burned?
- The fire only entered Rumphi (1,810 ha, 0.4 %).
- Where does this data come from?
- From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Malawi (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.
Where to verify it
A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.
Satellite cross-check
Does something look wrong on this page?
This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.
Report an error
Where this data comes from
The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.